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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24116881">we need you at home</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/sspideyman/pseuds/sspideyman'>sspideyman</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>we grow (even if it's slow) [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Marvel Cinematic Universe</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Aftermath of Torture, Found Family, Hydra Peter Parker, aged up Peter parker, hes learning okay, just let him be</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-05-11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-06-19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-18 03:29:20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Not Rated</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>3,167</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24116881</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/sspideyman/pseuds/sspideyman</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>and so the boy follows</p><p>he follows, knowing he wouldn’t be able to get past the winter soldier and his friends<br/>he follows, because the winter soldier knows what the boy has been ignoring, that hydra is gone<br/>and he follows, thinking of the words the winter soldier had told him</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Harley Keener &amp; Peter Parker, James "Bucky" Barnes &amp; Peter Parker, Peter Parker &amp; Morgan Stark (Marvel Cinematic Universe), Peter Parker &amp; Pepper Potts, Peter Parker &amp; Sam Wilson</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>we grow (even if it's slow) [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1719979</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>5</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>138</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Chapter 1</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>James, he learns, is the Winter Soldiers name. That’s what he asked The Boy to call him after The Boy finally spoke. James also said to call him Bucky, but The Boy knew that was only for friends, and by no means were they friends.</p><p>Sam is Captain America. The Boy already knew this. He was introduced originally to the world as the Falcon, but after they reversed the Decimation, he took up the shield. The Boy thinks that the Falcon was cooler, but now Captain America flies, so that’s something.</p><p>Harley is the third. He’s the one encased in iron. ‘Iron Lad’ is what he was referred as. A tribute to Iron Man, The Boy supposes. But there’s not a blood relation, he learns.</p><p>The Boy follows them all the way to a lake house. It’s nice, he notes, as James tells him where to park. Harley and Sam are in the vehicle behind him, blocking his car in, as if that was an effective mode of stopping him. The Boy could easily outrun any of them, and he knows that James knows that.</p><p>James leads The Boy inside, where many people are waiting in the front room. The first The Boy notices, is the blue skinned girl. Her stance shows she’s ready to fight at the moments notice, her eyes echoing the motion. Stood next to her is a man, braces wrapping around his legs. His arms are crossed, a sign of protection of this house, The Boy understands. Sat on the couch, is a woman. She looks tired, holding the hand of the young girl next to her. They share a likeness, one that The Boy recognizes them to be related, a mother and daughter. All four people watch The Boy enter the room with James eyeing him carefully. Harley and Sam are behind The Boy, blocking the door.</p><p>Personally, The Boy doesn’t know why he’s here, in this specific place. Is this some sort of safe house, a place to leave him, hide him, from Hydra?</p><p>The girl hops up, and without warning, runs into Harley’s arms, narrowly missing The Boy’s legs. He steps to the side as fast as he can, the awkward movement causing him to stumble over, bumping into James.</p><p>The Boy’s elbow hits James’ arm, the metal one, causing him to grimace in pain. He holds his arm to his abdomen, rubbing where he hit. James does not seem pained by this, but he does ask, “Are you alright?”, to which The Boy nods.</p><p>Harley holds the girl in a hug, and The Boys enhancements allow him to hear what they say, but he lets their voices fade out, instead listening to the unknown man speak to Sam.</p><p>”So have you told him anything? Does he know why he’s here?”</p><p>Sam shakes his head, “Bucky didn’t want to say anything to him until he got here. Said the kid is too much of a flight risk.”</p><p>The other man raises his eyebrows at Sam’s words. The Boy watches the man sneak a glance at him.</p><p>”The kid is a flight risk? Didn’t he come with you willingly?”</p><p>They both look at The Boy, and he turns his head away. </p><p>”Yeah, but who knows what’s going on in his head. Bucky said that he’s loyal to Hydra, but only because that’s all he’s known. Been there since he was a kid. What else was he going to do?” Sam’s face is neutral, he knows The Boy is watching him.</p><p>He’s decided he’s done watching and listening. The Boy clears his throat, though it’s only to gain their attention.</p><p>”I’m not a flight risk,” He stares at Sam, “I just haven’t been told what I’m doing here. So far, I can’t conclude on anything, since nobody has given me information since I left the parking lot two hours and eleven minutes ago.”</p><p>The room is silent.</p><p>The Boy could hear each person’s breathing, he could hear the way the couch cushion wheezed at the woman’s slight movement, he could hear Harley’s grip on the girl loosen, then tighten again, and he could hear the mechanics of the man’s braces whir as he takes a step towards The Boy.</p><p>”James Rhodes, a friend of your father.” He extends a hand to shake, which The Boy takes with caution. </p><p>The blue girl doesn’t move forward, but her introduction isn’t rude. She’s Nebula. That’s all The Boy needs to know right now. He nods. </p><p>The other woman introduces herself as Pepper, and the girl is her daughter, as The Boy suspected. Her name is Morgan. Harley is like Pepper’s son. </p><p>The Boy nods, taking in all the information and storing it for later use.</p><p>Rhodes tilts his head, “And your name?”</p><p>The Boy swallows, “Agent 235617, sometimes referred to as Agent Red, most often called The Boy.”</p><p>Silent. Again. The only one who doesn’t seem at all shocked or disturbed by his introduction is Nebula. She’s not fazed at all by his title, whereas Pepper, Rhodes, Harley, and Sam all look liked he wasn’t given a name.</p><p>”But you have a name, right? Bucky said you had a name?” Pepper looks from The Boy to James, face showing her desperation for an answer from one of them. James hesitates, leaving The Boy to answer.</p><p>”James called me by a different name while he was training me in Hydra, but it no longer matters. The part of me that was associated with that nickname is no longer.” The Boy looks at James for confirmation. </p><p>James’ face is one mixed of emotion. The Boy must’ve said something wrong.</p><p>”Eto ne pravil’nyy Dzheyms? Ili my razdelyayem otde l’nyye versil odnoy i toy zhe isotorii?”</p><p>
  <em>Is that not correct James? Or do we share separate versions of the same story?</em>
</p><p>James’ face darkens a bit at his words. The Boy can see how his question has angered him.</p><p>”Ty vse yeshche ty, Petya.”</p><p>
  <em>You are still you, Petya</em>
</p><p>The Boy’s face crinkles at the name. It has been so long since he’s been called that. Last he heard it, he was just sixteen, a child. James abandoned him when he was just a kid, and just wanted to be the next Winter Soldier.</p><p>”No.” The Boy shakes his head, “That is no longer my name.”</p><p>The Boy stares at James, willing for him to get it, to understand that when James left, he ripped everything from The Boy, who had to start anew. He received new trainers, new handlers, new weapons and gear. Everything and anything that remained of the Winter Soldier, gone. And that including the name The Boy was given by James. Petya. Simple. </p><p>“Mind letting us in on this conversation?” Sam asks, clearly not amused by the language barrier.</p><p>The Boy goes to speak, but James cuts him off.</p><p>”Petya. I called him Petya. I found his file unattended and learned some information on him. Managed to learn his name.”</p><p>No one speaks.</p><p>”Kid, this is your family. Or what you’ve got of it.”</p><p>The Boy sputters. No. No! He was Agent 235617, Agent Red, The Boy. His family was Hydra. Hydra raised him to be who he is today, one of the best agents they’ve ever seen. </p><p>”We didn’t want to spring too much information on you at once, but we don’t really have any other way of breaking this to you.” Rhodes motions towards Pepper.</p><p>”Your father is my late husband, Tony. He was never informed of you existence because your mother assumed he wouldn’t care. Which, knowing Tony, he probably would’ve brushed it off at the time.” She breathes, clasping her hands together in her lap. “But your mother, Mary, passed away when you were just a kid, and you were left with her husband, Richard Parker. Parker was desperate to raise higher in the Hydra ranks, so he did something that I can’t imagine any parent doing: he gave you as a trial, as a reason to keep him there.”</p><p>Pepper stopped. Unconsciously, The Boy had leaned toward her, listening intently on the only information he had ever been told on his parents.</p><p>”They planned Parker’s death just a year after that, leaving you at the mercy of Hydra and their plans. It was like you never existed.”</p><p>The Boy doesn’t understand. The story has holes. How did they know who his father was if his mother never told him? </p><p>“My mother never told my father about me. How do you know that he’s actually my father?”</p><p>”Your step-father’s brother and his wife both knew you, they had only met you once. But Mary confided in them who your father was. They didn’t reach out until years later, after your presumed death. That is, until Bucky escaped and gave us all the information on Hydra he could. The dots just connected themselves.” Sam speaks up, answering his question.</p><p>”So you recognized me in the store today?”</p><p>James gives him a smile, “Kid, we’ve been tracking you ever since we took down that Hydra base. We were just waiting for the right time.”</p><p>The air in the room is heavy, suffocating. The Boy’s world has crumbled beneath him in a matter of minutes. What he’s built his life on, what he’s believed for his 27 years of life, just gone. It’s like his throat has closed up, he feels like he could choke on this lump in his throat.</p><p>”I need to be alone.” </p><p>James nods, looking to one of the three new adults for guidance. This isn’t his home.</p><p>Nebula, who has been quiet, nods, and leads The Boy (though is that even his name anymore?) through the house to an empty guest room.</p><p>He takes a seat on the bed, and Nebula turns to leave. Before she closed the door behind her, she turns back.</p><p>”I, too, know what it’s like to be raised in the wrong side. It takes adjusting, but I’m sure you will be pleased, just as I am now.”</p><p>And the doors closed, leaving Agent 235617 alone to his thoughts. </p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. you could be happy</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>an empty mind, the feeling of being underwater<br/>his lungs burn, someone pulls him up</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>hello hello! I got a laptop so I'm finally done writing on my phone!!!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Everyone was careful around him. They didn't let him leave the lakehouse unattended. He wasn't left alone unless it was to bathe or sleep. James was who accompanied him most often, but sometimes Sam would go running with him, Nebula sat with him when he couldn't sleep, and Rhodes watched him while he tinkered in the workshop. He was never allowed to be alone with Morgan, or Harley. That was a rule both Pepper and Rhodes made very very clear.</p><p>But though this was technically his family, he remains an outsider. No matter how close he grew with James on past experiences, or fixing Rhodes' braces, he is still a threat to their crew. Even with their jokes, the way Morgan yells out for "Pete!" like he's been there for years instead of mere weeks, he still remembers his true calling.</p><p>To obey Hydra.</p><p>The thought stuck with him everyday, "You're betraying your home, the only place you've known." He tries to shake those thoughts away, or at least push them away, replaced with the new memories he's made over 3 weeks. But some things are too familiar; the way Harley watches him with careful eyes when he's in the same room as Morgan feels too much like the way his supervisor would watch him when he wasn't restrained; the way James sat outside his door, on watch until the next shift; the way Pepper would smile softly all the while keeping her distance, like many of the scientists would as he walked the halls. Everything reminded him of home, everything told reminded him he was always going to be a traitor. </p><p>The Boy carefully enters the kitchen, guard never let down. Pepper is mixing breakfast, Harley and Morgan helping along, as children should. Rhodes was sat in the dining room, reading the news on his StarkPad, Sam across from him turning the page of his novel. The Boy was about to ask where James and Nebula were, when they stepped through the front door, arms full of grocery bags. </p><p>"Good morning Pete! You're looking as chipper as always." Rhodes is the one who notices him in the doorway first, almost always is. He always tells the Boy something that doesn't quite make sense. He once called him 'sunshine', which didn't make sense to the Boy at all, since he was a human, but he never questions it.</p><p>"Harley, help Bucky and Nebula with their stuff." Pepper nudges him, and like the good, normal son he is, Harley takes bags from James' arms. </p><p>The Boy never knows what to say when the group is all in the same place. It's like they all pull him in different directions, and he can't answer all their questions at once. He's found it better when one talks to him. </p><p>"Peter, I asked if you would like to go with Harley and I?" The groceries are put away from James' arms, and he now stands closer to the Boy in the hallway. </p><p>The Boy thinks about the proposition. "What would we be doing?"</p><p>"Just go along the running path around the lake," Harley cracks a smile, "Think you're up for it?"</p><p>The Boy smiles back, his lips curving up into what is barely different than his resting face, "I could beat both of you any day."</p><p>-</p><p>Their race starts on the steps of the porch, or that's what the Boy quickly learns when both his companions start running as soon as they're out the door. </p><p>Though he had a later start, he quickly passes them. Running is something he's always excelled at Hydra, and he figured out quickly that if he focused on the sound of his feet hitting the ground, everything else faded away.</p><p>And that's what he did today. The birds chirping was silenced, the small creek he passed over made no sound as he ran over it. No rustle of the leaves in the wind, no snap of twigs from underneath him. </p><p>It also meant he missed the yell from the two runners from behind, a warning of what happened next. </p><p>Below his feet as he landed, the ground fell through. The rocky ground slid to the side, down the steep decline, the rocks taking the Boy with him. His ankle twisted, arms flying. It's only the moment before he disappears into the lake does he hear a yell. From above, James cries out:</p><p>"Peter!"</p><p>And then, it's quiet again, water filling his ears, silencing any sound from above. In any other circumstance, he would say it's peaceful, calming. The Boy tries to swim up, begging to reach the surface before he runs out of time, but his leg is caught under a fairly large rock. His still breath is burning his lungs, the surrounding water mocking him for what he can't do, and he has no choice but to open his mouth. The cold water enters his lungs, an eerily parallel feeling to being unable to breath. He attempts again to pull his leg from under the rock, but he's stuck, every time her tugs at his limb, he can see the red disperse into the water. With an uneasy feeling stuck in his stomach, he realizes Hydra never trained him for this, for drowning. They taught him to survive the worst scenarios, to live through fires, natural disasters, but never prepared him for this. For actually dying. </p><p>He watches a light grow brighter, and wonders how it got all the way down here, at the bottom of the lake. He wishes it were warmer, wishes it kept the black from seeping into his vision, but it makes him want to close his eyes from the brightness. He's readying himself for the end, to be down here forever, but he notices, the light is growing brighter and brighter, as well as warmer. The Boy notices the weight is no longer on his leg, and someone is pulling him towards the surface. He wonders who this is, who came to save him? </p><p>They break the surface of the lake, where the Boy feels more disoriented. Underwater was calmer, quieter. He wishes to go back. He cries out from the cold of the wind above water, he tries to pry himself out of these arms, he had come to terms with his death. </p><p>"Ha'ly 'lp me ou' 'ere." Someone says, not to the Boy, though. Whoever saved him must have a partner. </p><p>He's being dragged across the ground, the grass scratching his arms, the sun a blur in his eyes. He feels something pounding on his chest, and hears a vague yell come from above him. The light hurts his eyes, so he closes them. It's better. He feels better now. The feeling from underwater returns.</p><p>As quickly as the feeling returned, it once again disappeared. The pounding on his chest makes his lungs burn.</p><p>"Pete! Stay with me!" It's a cry for help from whoever pulled him out. His eyes snap open, above him is James, he's who was pounding on his chest. Harley is stood above the both of them, and the Boy notices that both of them seemed to have been crying the tears still falling down Harley's face. </p><p>The Boy coughs, liquid coming up. "I wan' to go home." </p><p>"We're getting you home now, you're going to be okay." Harley grabs his hand, helping the Boy into James' arms. It's warm, warmer than the air that's chilling him yo his bones. </p><p>Home home home. That's all the Boy wishes to do, is go home. Finally someone understands, deciphered the thought from his distance looks, from his silent cries for help. Hydra is the only place he truly belongs, and now he can go back. It's the only place where there's no judgement from whomever he passes in the hallway, where he's free to live his life as it's meant to be.</p><p>But, does he really want to leave behind what's been built at the lakehouse? The way Nebula greets him in the night, on the days neither of them can fall asleep. The way Morgan calls out for him to come play with her and Harley. The looks from Rhodes and Pepper, a fondness he's never been looked at with before. The way Sam would immediately understand what he meant even when he couldn't find the words. The way James had showed him to survive without an order from a superior. The way they had showed him how to be a family, though only half of them were related by blood. </p><p>The way they all smiled when he walked into a room, a gesture that he still wasn't used to yet, but surely would miss it if he found Hydra again.</p><p>As James rushes him back down the path, shivering and leg numb, the Boy decided he liked it here. He liked being Pyotr, Peter, Pete, kiddo, sunshine. He never wanted that to end.</p><p> </p><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>wow so she's back, I kept coming back to this, writing or editing one sentence and then leaving it again. but as college gets rougher this semester, writing and creating something that's not worth a grade makes me feel a little less anxious. it's nice </p><p>until next time!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
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